FIR on rapper’s ‘offensive’ lyrics

Dec. 31 (PTI): Amid the public outrage at the December 16 gang rape, an FIR has been lodged in Lucknow against rapper Honey Singh for lyrics that are “offensive” to women.

An online petition has demanded a ban on his performances and cancellation of his New Year’s Eve programme at Gurgaon’s Bristol Hotel too. Television channels reported the hotel had cancelled the show but hotel authorities said they were going ahead with the performance.

“The show is still on. Top police officers of Gurgaon visited our hotel and inspected all the security arrangements,” the hotel’s chief financial officer said.

The FIR was lodged by Gomti Nagar police on a complaint from an IPS officer, Amitabh Thakur, that the songs were “extremely vulgar, lewd and indecent and act as an offensive catalyst for crime against women”.

Singh, 28, faces obscenity charges that can bring a jail term of up to three years. He was unavailable for comment.

The singer raps mostly in a mix of English and Punjabi and has sung for recent Bollywood films such as Khiladi 786, Cocktail and Luv Shuv Te Chicken Khurana.

The online campaign began during the past fortnight’s rape protests. Social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter have been reverberating with outrage against the rapper for the past few days.

“These pornographic lyrics are unacceptable and it is because of women-hating sentiments like these that men think that it’s fine to do what they did on that bus that December night in Delhi,” says the petition filed by activist Kalpana Misra.

“Let’s put a stop to these subversive lyrics that infiltrate the minds of people who don’t know better....”